Before Climbing the Leader Board, Rising With the Sun

British Open 2014: Golfers Start Early at Royal Liverpool

David Howell was the first to tee off at the British Open on Thursday, at 6:25 a.m. Howell set his alarm clock for 4:15. The Open has the earliest start time of golf’s major championships.Credit
Andrew Redington/Getty Images

HOYLAKE, England — The oldest of golf’s major championships is also the earliest of golf’s major championships.

This is not without consequences.

Steven Brotherhood, David Howell’s caddie, set his alarm for 3:30 a.m. on Thursday.

“In 10 years of doing this, that’s the earliest I’ve had to get up for a start,” Brotherhood said.

Howell, an Englishman who was scheduled to hit the first shot of the British Open, set his alarm for 4:15 and woke up unprompted at 4:11.

Others made their way on foot, walking through the empty streets of the neighboring town West Kirby, past storefronts bearing specially printed British Open signs that had been flipped to read, “Sorry We’re Not Open.”

No apologies should be required at 5 a.m., but inside the gates of Royal Liverpool, golf carts were delivering employees and goods to various points. When the gates were opened to the public at 6 a.m., there was a civilized rush for the first hole, and by the time Howell’s threesome arrived for its 6:25 tee time, the large grandstand at the first tee was only about 20 souls short of a full house.

“You think, Do people not sleep?” Brotherhood said.

The Open has the earliest start of the majors in part because of geography: At these latitudes in July, the days are long. And the Masters, which had a field of 97 this year, has many fewer rounds to get through than the Open, with its field of 156. Although the P.G.A. Championship and the United States Open also have large fields, they start from two tees — the first and the 10th — to accelerate the process.

Still, the United States Open started quite early this year, too: 6:45 a.m. What truly separates the British Open from the other majors — and nearly every other tournament — is the length of the day’s play.

Thursday’s last stroke was a short par putt by Chris Rodgers at 8:59 p.m., 14 hours 34 minutes after Howell, his English compatriot, struck his opening drive.

With sunrise at 5:07 a.m. and sunset at 9:31 p.m., the Open actually had light available for even more golf. But Thursday’s output certainly must have seemed sufficient to Ivor Robson, the Open’s gray-haired, reedy-voiced announcer, who had to give a proper hail and farewell to all 52 threesomes on the first tee.

Peter Dawson, the chief executive of the R & A, which conducts the British Open, was there by Robson’s side at the beginning. He was one of those who had picked Howell and his playing partners to start the festivities. There is no random draw for the Open, no hard-and-fast criteria. But there is a working formula: geographical diversity.

British Open

In terms of career achievement, this was a high-profile group for such an early start. All are former Ryder Cup players, and Duval won the 2001 Open.

But viewed through the lens of recent achievement, their profiles are not nearly so high, so they were first-group material: familiar enough to kick off the pomp and circumstance but lacking the rankings or present-day currency to be placed in the prime starting times later in the morning.

“They don’t send Tiger Woods out at 6:25,” said John Alderson, 66, from Harrogate in North Yorkshire, who was in the crowd at the first hole.

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Woods got the 9:04 slot and the usual attention on Thursday, but, as he likes to practice at the crack of dawn, Woods would presumably not mind an early round, when there are fewer cameras about.

Grist for thought for the R & A. But the fans who followed the first group, like Alderson, a regular first-grouper, still enjoyed what was on offer.

“It’s less crowded, and you can follow all 18 holes without much trouble,” Alderson said.

And so they did, with the nearly full grandstand at the first tee soon giving way to nearly empty grandstands the rest of the round. Howell, Karlsson and Duval played in the early-morning sunlight to the sound of very few hands clapping and to the occasional blare from the large video screens scattered around the course. With no players ahead of them to slow them down, that was a rare impediment.

“To be honest, we’re used to playing in front of no one,” Howell said. “Obviously at the big tournaments we have big crowds, but anywhere else in the world on Thursday morning, there’s not a lot of people around watching. So that’s not unusual. The much bigger problem was the televisions in the tented villages. The noise from those was putting us off a little bit.”

The course, however, was particularly inviting: relatively soft for a first-rate links after rain on Wednesday, close to becalmed, with the flags hanging limply on their sticks and the subtle wind shifts more noticeable to the combatants than to those tramping along beside them.

“It went from northeast to southeast and a bit around and everywhere,” Karlsson said of the breeze. “So it was a bit tricky, but if you call this tricky, I’ll take this tricky.”

It was a good line considering the sort of summer weather this stretch of northwestern England can dish out, and the sort of stormy, windy weather it is forecast to dish out Friday morning.

Thursday was clearly the clear day to pile on the birdies, and Karlsson ultimately did it best in the threesome, shooting a three-under-par 69 that put him in the lead but by day’s end left him tied for 10th with Woods and seven others.

Howell had to settle for a 72, Duval for a 73. At least they were both set to get some more sleep Friday morning, with an 11:26 a.m. start.

The 6:25 a.m. slot went to Hiroshi Iwata, Matthew Southgate and James McLeary.

McLeary sounded more than ready for the challenge and not just because, with two young children, he is accustomed to sleep deprivation.

“In South Africa, at my first event on the main European Tour this year, I teed off at something like 10 past 6,” he said. “It was a two-ball, and they were still serving breakfast when we came in. That’s how early we teed off. I actually had two bacon and eggs that day — two breakfasts.”

A version of this article appears in print on July 18, 2014, on Page B12 of the New York edition with the headline: Before Climbing the Leader Board, Rising With the Sun. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe